If you see a fireball in the night sky, you can now report it to the IMO through our new fireball form! Translated into more than 25 languages, the form guides you through describing what you saw in a way that provides useful information to astronomers studying meteors. The information you provide can be combined with that of other eye-witnesses to give a good estimate of the trajectory of the fireball, and to help determine if a ground fall occurred.

Assuming no specialist astronomical knowledge or observing experience, the form easily takes you through the process of reporting a fireball sighting in detail. The information gathered from the submitted reports is collected into a public database which can be searched for particular events.

A large team of IMO volunteers has been hard at work translating the fireball form into more than 25 languages, and the IMO is now busy publicising it to local astronomical societies and observing groups around the world. Large fireball events often excite local media; if such an event happens in your region you can help by telling people about the form so that they can report what they saw.

If you would like to contribute a new translation in a language not already covered, or spot a mistake in the text of the form in your native language, please get in touch so that we can fix it, or follow the instructions to translators.

The IMO fireball report can be easily customized and branded for amateur societies, observatories, institutions or other astronomical organizations who receive fireball reports and enquiries from the public (see the Turkish Uzaybimer version for example, you may need to clear your browser cache). For more details, and to set up an account for your organization, please contact vperlerin@gmail.com.

If you would like to test the form without submitting a false event to the database, please use the test version of the form.

Meteor Showers Calendar

Next major shower peak

The Geminids are usually the strongest meteor shower of the year and
meteor enthusiasts are certain to circle December 13 and 14 on their
calendars. This is the one major shower that provides good activity
prior to midnight as the constellation of Gemini is well placed from
10pm onward. The Geminids…